Data storage is a critical component for computing. In a computing device, it is common for the backup and archive data stored in file systems to be kept for extended periods of time. Often the expected lifespan of the data will outlast the lifespan of any storage device in the system. As a result, it is important to be able to incrementally upgrade file systems and upgrade, replace, and decommission storage devices in a data storage system.
Traditionally, some of the most common upgrades customers need to perform is disk drive upgrades and file system upgrades. This is because disk drives quickly increase in capacity and performance, and can have reliability issues that require the disks to be removed from the system. Further, upgrading the file systems and thus upgrading to larger capacity drives can reduce the system's footprint in a customer's data center, which saves rack space, cooling, and power costs for the customer. Upgrading drives with faster drive technology can improve system performance. Removing drives with known issues from a shelf and replacing them with more reliable models can also improve data reliability and reduce customer support cases. The shelf, which refers to an enclosure for a storage device, provides portability for the storage devices and efficient accessibility to transfer data from one or more storage devices.
In addition, one of most time-consuming problems customers face today is upgrading file systems in the data storage system. For example, conventionally a storage volume is presented to a file system layer, which formats an on-disk layout. As such, upgrading the data layout in such file systems typically involves rewriting metadata corresponding to each block, which may be spread throughout the storage volume and at times along with the block itself. As a result, upgrading file systems traditionally involves an input and output (IO) for each block in the file system, leading to a sizeable IO intensive process where the time-to-upgrade scales and increases with the number of blocks in the file system.
Accordingly, this conventional process is time consuming, labor-intensive, and expensive. As such, what is needed to overcome the described shortcomings and improve customer demand is a time-efficient method for concurrently upgrading a file system in a data storage environment, which can thus allow customers to upgrade, replace, and decommission disk drives at the shelf and thus migrate the data to upgraded shelves containing newer devices.